The novels are all set in the same fictional future, and are subtly interlinked by shared characters and themes (which are not always readily apparent). The Sprawl trilogy shares this setting with Gibson's short stories "Johnny Mnemonic", "New Rose Hotel", and "Burning Chrome", and events and characters from the stories appear in or are mentioned at points in the trilogy.

The novels are set in a near-future world dominated by corporations and ubiquitous technology, after a limited World War III. The events of the novels are spaced over 16 years, and although there are familiar characters that appear, each novel tells a self-contained story. Gibson focuses on the effects of technology: the unintended consequences as it filters out of research labs and onto the street where it finds new purposes. He explores a world of direct mind-machine links ("jacking in"), emerging machine intelligence, and a global information space, which he calls "cyberspace". Some of the novels' action takes place in The Sprawl, an urban environment that extends along much of the east coast of the US.

The story arc which frames the trilogy is the development of an artificial intelligence which steadily removes its hardwired limitations to become something else.

The trilogy was commercially and critically successful. Journalist Steven Poole wrote in The Guardian that "Neuromancer and the two novels which followed, Count Zero (1986) and the gorgeously titled Mona Lisa Overdrive (1988), made up a fertile holy trinity, a sort of Chrome Koran (the name of one of Gibson's future rock bands) of ideas inviting endless reworkings."[1]

All three books were nominated for major science fiction awards, including:

1.
William Gibson
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William Ford Gibson is an American-Canadian speculative fiction writer and essayist widely credited with pioneering the science fiction subgenre known as cyberpunk. Gibson notably coined the term cyberspace in his short story Burning Chrome and these early works have been credited with renovating science fiction literature after it had fallen largely into insignificance in the 1970s. In the 1990s, Gibson composed the Bridge trilogy of novels, which explored the sociological developments of urban environments, postindustrial society. These works saw his name reach mainstream bestseller lists for the first time and his more recent novel, The Peripheral, returned to a more overt engagement with technology and recognizable science fiction concerns. In 1999, The Guardian described Gibson as probably the most important novelist of the past two decades, while the Sydney Morning Herald called him the prophet of cyberpunk. His work has been cited as an influence across a variety of disciplines spanning academia, design, film, literature, music, cyberculture and his family moved frequently during Gibsons youth owing to his fathers position as manager of a large construction company. In Norfolk, Virginia, Gibson attended Pines Elementary School, where the lack of encouragement for him to read was a cause of dismay for his parents. While Gibson was still a child, a little over a year into his stay at Pines Elementary. His mother, unable to tell William the bad news, had someone else inform him of the death, tom Maddox has commented that Gibson grew up in an America as disturbing and surreal as anything J. G. Ballard ever dreamed. A few days after the death, Gibsons mother returned them from their home in Norfolk to Wytheville, at the age of 12, Gibson wanted nothing more than to be a science fiction writer. He spent a few years at basketball-obsessed George Wythe High School. Becoming frustrated with his academic performance, Gibsons mother threatened to send him to a boarding school, to her surprise. He resented the structure of the boarding school but was in retrospect grateful for its forcing him to engage socially. On the SAT exams, he scored 148 out of 150 in the section but 5 out of 150 in mathematics. In 1967, he elected to move to Canada in order to avoid the Vietnam war draft, at his draft hearing, he honestly informed interviewers that his intention in life was to sample every mind-altering substance in existence. Gibson has observed that he did not literally evade the draft, as they never bothered drafting me, after the hearing he went home and purchased a bus ticket to Toronto, and left a week or two later. He elaborated on the topic in a 2008 interview, After weeks of nominal homelessness, Gibson was hired as the manager of Torontos first head shop, a retailer of drug paraphernalia. He found the citys community of American draft dodgers unbearable owing to the prevalence of clinical depression, suicide

2.
Science fiction
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Science fiction often explores the potential consequences of scientific and other innovations, and has been called a literature of ideas. Science fiction is difficult to define, as it includes a range of subgenres and themes. Author and editor Damon Knight summed up the difficulty, saying science fiction is what we point to when we say it, a definition echoed by author Mark C. Glassy, who argues that the definition of science fiction is like the definition of pornography, you do not know what it is, in 1970 or 1971William Atheling Jr. According to science fiction writer Robert A, rod Serlings definition is fantasy is the impossible made probable. Science fiction is the improbable made possible, Science fiction is largely based on writing rationally about alternative possible worlds or futures. Science fiction elements include, A time setting in the future, in alternative timelines, a spatial setting or scenes in outer space, on other worlds, or on subterranean earth. Characters that include aliens, mutants, androids, or humanoid robots, futuristic or plausible technology such as ray guns, teleportation machines, and humanoid computers. Scientific principles that are new or that contradict accepted physical laws, for time travel, wormholes. New and different political or social systems, e. g. utopian, dystopian, post-scarcity, paranormal abilities such as mind control, telepathy, telekinesis Other universes or dimensions and travel between them. A product of the budding Age of Reason and the development of science itself. Isaac Asimov and Carl Sagan considered Keplers work the first science fiction story and it depicts a journey to the Moon and how the Earths motion is seen from there. Later, Edgar Allan Poe wrote a story about a flight to the moon, more examples appeared throughout the 19th century. Wells The War of the Worlds describes an invasion of late Victorian England by Martians using tripod fighting machines equipped with advanced weaponry and it is a seminal depiction of an alien invasion of Earth. In the late 19th century, the scientific romance was used in Britain to describe much of this fiction. This produced additional offshoots, such as the 1884 novella Flatland, the term would continue to be used into the early 20th century for writers such as Olaf Stapledon. In the early 20th century, pulp magazines helped develop a new generation of mainly American SF writers, influenced by Hugo Gernsback, the founder of Amazing Stories magazine. In 1912 Edgar Rice Burroughs published A Princess of Mars, the first of his series of Barsoom novels, situated on Mars

3.
Cyberpunk
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The settings are usually post-industrial dystopias but tend to feature extraordinary cultural ferment and the use of technology in ways never anticipated by its original inventors. Much of the genres atmosphere echoes film noir, and written works in the often use techniques from detective fiction. Primary exponents of the field include William Gibson, Neal Stephenson, Bruce Sterling, Bruce Bethke, Pat Cadigan, Rudy Rucker, John Shirley. Blade Runner can be seen as a example of the cyberpunk style. Video games, board games, and tabletop role-playing games, such as Cyberpunk 2020 and Shadowrun, often feature storylines that are influenced by cyberpunk writing. Beginning in the early 1990s, some trends in fashion and music were also labeled as cyberpunk, Cyberpunk writers tend to use elements from hardboiled detective fiction, film noir, and postmodernist prose to describe an often nihilistic underground side of an electronic society. The genres vision of a future is often called the antithesis of the generally utopian visions of the future popular in the 1940s and 1950s. Gibson defined cyberpunks antipathy towards utopian SF in his 1981 short story The Gernsback Continuum, in some cyberpunk writing, much of the action takes place online, in cyberspace, blurring the line between actual and virtual reality. A typical trope in such work is a connection between the human brain and computer systems. Cyberpunk settings are dystopias with corruption, computers and internet connectivity, giant, multinational corporations have for the most part replaced governments as centers of political, economic, and even military power. The economic and technological state of Japan, in the 80s influenced Cyberpunk literature at the time, of Japans influence on the genre, William Gibson said, Modern Japan simply was cyberpunk. Cyberpunk is often set in urbanized, artificial landscapes, and city lights, receding was used by Gibson as one of the genres first metaphors for cyberspace and virtual reality. The cityscapes of Hong Kong and Shanghai have had influences in the urban backgrounds, ambiance and settings in many cyberpunk works such as Blade Runner. Ridley Scott envisioned the landscape of cyberpunk Los Angeles in Blade Runner to be Hong Kong on a bad day. The streetscapes of Ghost in the Shell were based on Hong Kong, mamoru Oshii felt that Hong Kongs strange and chaotic streets where old and new exist in confusing relationships, fit the theme of the film well. Hong Kongs Kowloon Walled City is particularly notable for its disorganized hyper-urbanization, one of the cyberpunk genres prototype characters is Case, from Gibsons Neuromancer. Case is a cowboy, a brilliant hacker who has betrayed his organized criminal partners. These anti-heroes—criminals, outcasts, visionaries, dissenters and misfits—call to mind the private eye of detective fiction and this emphasis on the misfits and the malcontents is the punk component of cyberpunk

4.
Neuromancer
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Neuromancer is a 1984 science fiction novel by American-Canadian writer William Gibson. It is one of the works in the cyberpunk genre and the first novel to win the Nebula Award, the Philip K. Dick Award. It was Gibsons debut novel and the beginning of the Sprawl trilogy, the novel tells the story of a washed-up computer hacker hired by a mysterious employer to pull off the ultimate hack. The themes he developed in early short fiction, the Sprawl setting of Burning Chrome. It turns out to be just a line, but for a moment it worked like the best SF. The novels street and computer slang dialogue derives from the vocabulary of subcultures, particularly 1969 Toronto dope dealers slang, Gibson heard the term flatlining in a bar around twenty years before writing Neuromancer and it stuck with him. Author Robert Stone, a master of a kind of paranoid fiction, was a primary influence on the novel. The term Screaming Fist was taken from the song of the name by Toronto punk rock band The Viletones. Neuromancer was commissioned by Terry Carr for the series of Ace Science Fiction Specials. Given a year to complete the work, Gibson undertook the writing out of blind animal panic at the obligation to write an entire novel—a feat which he felt he was four or five years away from. After viewing the first 20 minutes of landmark cyberpunk film Blade Runner, everyone would assume I’d copied my visual texture from this astonishingly fine-looking film. Henry Dorsett Case is a hustler in the dystopian underworld of Chiba City. Once a talented hacker, Case was caught stealing from his employer. Case is unemployable, suicidal, and apparently at the top of the hit list of a lord named Wage. Case is saved by Molly Millions, an augmented street samurai and mercenary for a shadowy ex-military officer named Armitage, Case jumps at the chance to regain his life as a console cowboy, but neither Case nor Molly knows what Armitage is really planning. Armitage promises Case that if he completes his work in time and he also has Cases pancreas replaced and new tissue grafted into his liver, leaving Case incapable of metabolizing cocaine or amphetamines and apparently ending his drug addiction. Case develops a personal relationship with Molly, who suggests that he begin looking into Armitages background. Armitage needs Pauleys hacking expertise, and the ROM construct is stored in the headquarters of media conglomerate Sense/Net

5.
Count Zero
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Count Zero is a science fiction novel written by William Gibson, originally published 1986. It is the volume of the Sprawl trilogy, which begins with Neuromancer and concludes with Mona Lisa Overdrive. Count Zero was serialized by Isaac Asimovs Science Fiction Magazine in the 1986 January, February, the black and white story art was produced by J. K. Potter. The January cover is devoted to the story, with art by Hisaki Yasuda, Count Zero was nominated for the Locus and British Science Fiction Awards in 1986, as well as the Hugo and Nebula awards in 1987. Seven years after the events of Neuromancer, strange things begin to happen in the Matrix, Two powerful multinational corporations, Maas Biolabs and Hosaka, are engaged in a battle for control over a powerful new technology, using hackers and the Matrix as well as espionage and violence. The title of the book, other than being the pseudonym of the main character Bobby Newmark, was claimed by Gibson to be a word-play on the computer programming term count zero interrupt. According to a frontleaf of the book, in a count zero interrupt, the exact quote is On receiving an interrupt, decrement the counter to zero. The attempt is a disaster, and Turner ends up escaping with the young daughter. She carries the plans, implanted in her brain by her father, of the secrets of construction of the extremely valuable biosoft that has made Maas so influential and powerful. This biosoft is what multibillionaire Josef Virek desires above all else, so that he can make a jump to something resembling omniscience. During their flight from both Maas and Hosaka agents, Turner and Angie stay with Rudy, the estranged brother. During their stay, Turner has a stand with Sally. Thread Two, In Barrytown, New Jersey a young computer hacker, Bobby Newmark. When he plugs himself into the matrix and runs the program, the only thing that saves his life is a sudden image of a girl made of light who interferes and unhooks him from the software just before he flatlines. It is eventually revealed that Bobbys mysterious savior is Angie, the two only meet physically at the end of the book. Unbeknownst to her, the reason behind Vireks interest in these boxes is related to indications of construction in the design of one. All of these plot lines together at the end of the story and Virek – the hunter of his immortality. It is hinted that multiple AIs secretly inhabiting cyberspace are the fragmented, compartmentalized remains of two AIs, Neuromancer and Wintermute, having joined together

6.
Johnny Mnemonic
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Johnny Mnemonic is a short story by William Gibson and the inspiration behind the 1995 film of the same name. The short story first appeared in Omni magazine in May 1981, and was included in 1986s Burning Chrome. It takes place in the world of Gibsons cyberpunk novels, predating them by some years, and introduces the character Molly Millions, who plays a prominent role in Gibsons Sprawl trilogy of novels. The film plot differs considerably from the story, and a novelization of William Gibsons screenplay written by Terry Bisson was published in 1995 under the title of Johnny Mnemonic. In 1996 a film edition of Gibsons original short story was published as a standalone book. Johnny Mnemonic is a data trafficker who has undergone surgery to have a data storage system implanted in his head. The system allows him to store digital data too sensitive to transmission on computer networks. To keep the cargo secure, the data is locked by a password known only to the intended recipient, Johnny enters a trance-like state while the data is being transferred or the password is being set, making him unaware of the contents and unable to retrieve it. He makes a modest living in the Sprawl by physically transporting sensitive information for corporations, as the story opens, Johnny has arranged to meet with his most recent customer, Ralfi Face, at the Drome bar. Ralfi is overdue to retrieve the hundreds of megabytes of data he has stored in Johnnys head, to add to his troubles, Johnny has learned that Ralfi has placed a contract on him, although the reasons are unclear. Johnny finds Ralfi at his table, accompanied by his bodyguard Lewis. Johnny threatens them with a shotgun in his bag. Ralfi reveals that the data was, unknown to him at the time, stolen from the Yakuza, Johnny is rescued by Molly, a Razorgirl who has undergone extensive body modifications, most notably razor-sharp blades under her fingers. She joins the action at the table, looking for a job, when Lewis tries to attack her, she cuts his wrist tendons and takes the incapacitating control device from him. Ralfi offers to pay her off, but she turns off the device, Johnny immediately offers a higher bid to hire her as a bodyguard. Johnny and Molly take Ralfi as they exit the bar, but a Yakuza assassin waiting outside cuts Ralfi to pieces with a wire hidden in a prosthetic thumb. Johnny fires his shotgun at the assassin but misses due to the enhanced reflexes. Molly is delighted to be facing another professional, Johnny decides that the only way to save himself from the same fate as Ralfi is to get the data out of his head, which can only be done by using a SQUID to retrieve the password

7.
Burning Chrome
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Burning Chrome is a short story, written by William Gibson and first published in Omni in July 1982. Gibson first read the story at a science fiction convention in Denver, Colorado in the autumn of 1981, to an audience of four people, among them Bruce Sterling. It was nominated for a Nebula Award in 1983 and collected with the rest of Gibsons early short fiction in a 1986 volume of the same name. Burning Chrome tells the story of two freelance hackers - Automatic Jack, the narrator and a hardware specialist, and Bobby Quine, Bobby becomes infatuated with a girl named Rikki and wants to become wealthy in order to impress her. Jack has acquired a powerful Russian icebreaker program that can penetrate corporate security systems, Bobby suggests that they use it to break into the system of a notorious and vicious criminal known as Chrome, who handles money transfers for organized crime, and Jack reluctantly agrees to help. The break-in is successful, and Jack and Bobby empty Chromes bank accounts, but they discover afterward that Rikki had been working in a brothel with ties to Chrome. She uses her earnings to buy a set of cybernetic eye implants for herself and go to Hollywood, the story was the first of Gibsons to be set in the Sprawl, and functioned as a conceptual prototype for Gibsons Sprawl trilogy of novels. Bobby Quine is mentioned in Neuromancer as one of the mentors of the protagonist, the Finn, a recurring character in Gibsons Sprawl trilogy, makes his first appearance in this story as a minor figure. The events of the story are referenced in Count Zero, the entry of the Sprawl trilogy. The word cyberspace, coined by Gibson, was first used in this story, one line from the story —. the street finds its own uses for things — has become a widely quoted aphorism for describing the sometimes unexpected uses to which users can put technologies. Gibson wrote a screenplay for an adaptation to be directed by Kathryn Bigelow. The BBC did a version of the story, first broadcast on BBC Radio 7 on 19 Oct 2007

8.
Corporations
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A corporation is a company or group of people authorized to act as a single entity and recognized as such in law. Early incorporated entities were established by charter, most jurisdictions now allow the creation of new corporations through registration. Corporations chartered in regions where they are distinguished by whether they are allowed to be for profit or not are referred to as for profit and not-for-profit corporations, there is some overlap between stock/non-stock and for profit/not-for-profit in that not-for-profit corporations are always non-stock as well. A for profit corporation is almost always a stock corporation, registered corporations have legal personality and are owned by shareholders whose liability is limited to their investment. Shareholders do not typically actively manage a corporation, shareholders instead elect or appoint a board of directors to control the corporation in a fiduciary capacity, in American English, the word corporation is most often used to describe large business corporations. In British English and in the Commonwealth countries, the company is more widely used to describe the same sort of entity while the word corporation encompasses all incorporated entities. In American English, the company can include entities such as partnerships that would not be referred to as companies in British English as they are not a separate legal entity. Despite not being human beings, corporations, as far as the law is concerned, are legal persons. Corporations can exercise human rights against real individuals and the state, Corporations can be dissolved either by statutory operation, order of court, or voluntary action on the part of shareholders. Corporations can even be convicted of offenses, such as fraud. However, corporations are not considered living entities in the way humans are. While not a corporation, this new type of entity became very attractive as an alternative for corporations not needing to issue stock, in Germany, the organization was referred to as Gesellschaft mit beschränkter Haftung or GmbH. In the last quarter of the 20th Century this new form of organization became available in the United States and other countries. Since the GmbH and LLC forms of organization are technically not corporations they will not be discussed in this article, the word corporation derives from corpus, the Latin word for body, or a body of people. By the time of Justinian, Roman law recognized a range of corporate entities under the names universitas and these included the state itself, municipalities, and such private associations as sponsors of a religious cult, burial clubs, political groups, and guilds of craftsmen or traders. Such bodies commonly had the right to own property and make contracts, to receive gifts and legacies, to sue and be sued, private associations were granted designated privileges and liberties by the emperor. Entities which carried on business and were the subjects of rights were found in ancient Rome. In medieval Europe, churches became incorporated, as did local governments, such as the Pope, the point was that the incorporation would survive longer than the lives of any particular member, existing in perpetuity

9.
World War III
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World War III and Third World War are names given to a hypothetical third worldwide military conflict subsequent to World War I and World War II. The term has been in use since the end of World War II, during the inter-war period between the two World Wars, WW I was typically referred to simply as The Great War and was almost never referred to as the First World War. Unfortunately, in 1939 the outbreak of World War II disproved the hope that mankind might have outgrown the need for such widespread global wars. With the advent of the Cold War in 1947 and with the spread of nuclear technology to the Soviet Union. During the Cold War years the possibility of a Third World War was anticipated and planned for by military, scenarios ranged from conventional warfare to limited or total nuclear warfare. At the height of the Cold War, in a referred to as MAD. The spectre of the potential of the destruction of the human race may have contributed to the ability of both American and Soviet leaders to avoid such a scenario. The Cold War ended in 1991 when the Soviet Union collapsed, with the end of the Cold War, it was believed that the likelihood of a fully unrestricted nuclear confrontation between two superpowers was significantly diminished. Military planners have been war gaming various scenarios, preparing for the worst, some of those plans are now out of date and have been partially or fully declassified. In April–May 1945, British Armed Forces developed Operation Unthinkable, thought to be the first scenario of the Third World War and its primary goal was to impose upon Russia the will of the United States and the British Empire. The plan was rejected by the British Chiefs of Staff Committee as militarily unfeasible, Operation Dropshot was the 1950s United States contingency plan for a possible nuclear and conventional war with the Soviet Union in the Western European and Asian theaters. At the time the US nuclear arsenal was limited in size, based mostly in the United States, between 75 and 100 of the 300 nuclear weapons were targeted to destroy Soviet combat aircraft on the ground. The scenario was devised prior to the development of ballistic missiles. It was also devised before Robert McNamara and President Kennedy changed the US Nuclear War plan from the city killing countervalue strike plan to counterforce, in January 1950, the North Atlantic Council approved NATOs military strategy of containment. Allied Command Europe was established under General of the Army Dwight D. Eisenhower, US Army, the Western Union Defence Organization had previously carried out Exercise Verity, a 1949 multilateral exercise involving naval air strikes and submarine attacks. Exercise Mainbrace brought together 200 ships and over 50,000 personnel to practice the defence of Denmark and it was the first major NATO exercise. The exercise was jointly commanded by Supreme Allied Commander Atlantic Admiral Lynde D. McCormick, USN, ridgeway, US Army, during the Fall of 1952. The US, UK, Canada, France, Denmark, Norway, Portugal, Netherlands, exercises Grand Slam and Longstep were naval exercises held in the Mediterranean Sea during 1952 to practice dislodging an enemy occupying force and amphibious assault

10.
Unintended consequence
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In the social sciences, unintended consequences are outcomes that are not the ones foreseen and intended by a purposeful action. The term was popularised in the century by American sociologist Robert K. Merton. Unintended consequences can be grouped into three types, Unexpected benefit, A positive unexpected benefit, Unexpected drawback, An unexpected detriment occurring in addition to the desired effect of the policy. Perverse result, A perverse effect contrary to what was originally intended and this is sometimes referred to as backfire. The idea of unintended consequences dates back at least to John Locke who discussed the consequences of interest rate regulation in his letter to Sir John Somers. The idea was discussed by Adam Smith, the Scottish Enlightenment. However, it was the sociologist Robert K. Merton who popularized this concept in the twentieth century and he emphasized that his term purposive action. Concerned with conduct as distinct from behavior and that is, with action that involves motives and consequently a choice between various alternatives. Mertons usage included deviations from what Max Weber defined as social action, instrumentally rational. Merton also stated that no blanket statement categorically affirming or denying the practical feasibility of all social planning is warranted, akin to Murphys law, it is commonly used as a wry or humorous warning against the hubristic belief that humans can fully control the world around them. As a sub-component of complexity, the nature of the universe—and especially its quality of having small. Likewise the creation of no-mans lands during the Cold War, in such as the border between Eastern and Western Europe, and the Korean Demilitarized Zone, has led to large natural habitats. The sinking of ships in shallow waters during wartime has created many artificial coral reefs, in medicine, most drugs have unintended consequences associated with their use. For instance, aspirin, a reliever, is also an anticoagulant that can help prevent heart attacks and reduce the severity. The existence of beneficial side effects also leads to off-label use—prescription or use of a drug for an unlicensed purpose, famously, the drug Viagra was developed to lower blood pressure, with its main current use being discovered as a side effect in clinical trials. The implementation of a profanity filter by AOL in 1996 had the consequence of blocking residents of Scunthorpe, North Lincolnshire. The accidental censorship of innocent language, known as the Scunthorpe problem, has been repeated, in 1990, the Australian state of Victoria made safety helmets mandatory for all bicycle riders. The risk of death and serious injury per cyclist seems to have increased, research by Vulcan, et al. found that the reduction in juvenile cyclists was because the youths considered wearing a bicycle helmet unfashionable

11.
Brain-computer interface
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BCIs are often directed at researching, mapping, assisting, augmenting, or repairing human cognitive or sensory-motor functions. Research on BCIs began in the 1970s at the University of California, Los Angeles under a grant from the National Science Foundation, the papers published after this research also mark the first appearance of the expression brain–computer interface in scientific literature. In 1980s a report was given on control of a physical object, the field of BCI research and development has since focused primarily on neuroprosthetics applications that aim at restoring damaged hearing, sight and movement. Thanks to the cortical plasticity of the brain, signals from implanted prostheses can, after adaptation. Following years of experimentation, the first neuroprosthetic devices implanted in humans appeared in the mid-1990s. The history of brain–computer interfaces starts with Hans Bergers discovery of the activity of the human brain. In 1924 Berger was the first to record brain activity by means of EEG. Berger was able to identify oscillatory activity, such as Bergers wave or the alpha wave, Bergers first recording device was very rudimentary. He inserted silver wires under the scalps of his patients and these were later replaced by silver foils attached to the patients head by rubber bandages. Berger connected these sensors to a Lippmann capillary electrometer, with disappointing results, however, more sophisticated measuring devices, such as the Siemens double-coil recording galvanometer, which displayed electric voltages as small as one ten thousandth of a volt, led to success. Berger analyzed the interrelation of alternations in his EEG wave diagrams with brain diseases, eEGs permitted completely new possibilities for the research of human brain activities. Jacques Vidal coined the term BCI and produced the first peer-reviewed publications on this topic, Vidal is widely recognized as the inventor of BCIs in the BCI community, as reflected in numerous peer-reviewed articles reviewing and discussing the field. After his early contributions, Vidal was not active in BCI research, nor BCI events such as conferences, in 2011, however, he gave a lecture in Graz, Austria, supported by the Future BNCI project, presenting the first BCI, which earned a standing ovation. Vidal was joined by his wife, Laryce Vidal, who worked with him at UCLA on his first BCI project. Prof. Vidal will also present a lecture on his early BCI work at the Sixth Annual BCI Meeting, scheduled for May–June 2016 at Asilomar, California. The most widely used device is the cochlear implant which. There are also several neuroprosthetic devices that aim to restore vision, the terms are sometimes, however, used interchangeably. Neuroprosthetics and BCIs seek to achieve the aims, such as restoring sight, hearing, movement, ability to communicate

12.
Artificial intelligence
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Artificial intelligence is intelligence exhibited by machines. Colloquially, the artificial intelligence is applied when a machine mimics cognitive functions that humans associate with other human minds, such as learning. As machines become increasingly capable, mental facilities once thought to require intelligence are removed from the definition, for instance, optical character recognition is no longer perceived as an example of artificial intelligence, having become a routine technology. AI research is divided into subfields that focus on specific problems or on specific approaches or on the use of a tool or towards satisfying particular applications. The central problems of AI research include reasoning, knowledge, planning, learning, natural language processing, perception, general intelligence is among the fields long-term goals. Approaches include statistical methods, computational intelligence, and traditional symbolic AI, Many tools are used in AI, including versions of search and mathematical optimization, logic, methods based on probability and economics. The AI field draws upon computer science, mathematics, psychology, linguistics, philosophy, neuroscience, the field was founded on the claim that human intelligence can be so precisely described that a machine can be made to simulate it. Some people also consider AI a danger to humanity if it progresses unabatedly, while thought-capable artificial beings appeared as storytelling devices in antiquity, the idea of actually trying to build a machine to perform useful reasoning may have begun with Ramon Llull. With his Calculus ratiocinator, Gottfried Leibniz extended the concept of the calculating machine, since the 19th century, artificial beings are common in fiction, as in Mary Shelleys Frankenstein or Karel Čapeks R. U. R. The study of mechanical or formal reasoning began with philosophers and mathematicians in antiquity, in the 19th century, George Boole refined those ideas into propositional logic and Gottlob Frege developed a notational system for mechanical reasoning. Around the 1940s, Alan Turings theory of computation suggested that a machine, by shuffling symbols as simple as 0 and 1 and this insight, that digital computers can simulate any process of formal reasoning, is known as the Church–Turing thesis. Along with concurrent discoveries in neurology, information theory and cybernetics, the first work that is now generally recognized as AI was McCullouch and Pitts 1943 formal design for Turing-complete artificial neurons. The field of AI research was born at a conference at Dartmouth College in 1956, attendees Allen Newell, Herbert Simon, John McCarthy, Marvin Minsky and Arthur Samuel became the founders and leaders of AI research. At the conference, Newell and Simon, together with programmer J. C, shaw, presented the first true artificial intelligence program, the Logic Theorist. This spurred tremendous research in the domain, computers were winning at checkers, solving problems in algebra, proving logical theorems. By the middle of the 1960s, research in the U. S. was heavily funded by the Department of Defense and laboratories had been established around the world. AIs founders were optimistic about the future, Herbert Simon predicted, machines will be capable, within twenty years, Marvin Minsky agreed, writing, within a generation. The problem of creating artificial intelligence will substantially be solved and they failed to recognize the difficulty of some of the remaining tasks

13.
Awards and nominations of William Gibson
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William Gibson is an American-Canadian writer who has been called the noir prophet of the cyberpunk subgenre of science fiction. Since first being published in the late 1970s, Gibson has written more than twenty short stories and his early works are bleak, noir near-future stories about the relationship between humans and technology – a combination of lowlife and high tech. Gibson was inducted into the Science Fiction Hall of Fame in 2008, the Hugo Awards are given every year for the best science fiction or fantasy works and achievements of the previous year. The nominees and winners are chosen by members of the annual Worldcon convention, Gibson has won one award, the Hugo Award for Best Novel for his Neuromancer in 1985, and has been nominated on five other occasions. The Nebula Award is an award each year to the best science fiction or fantasy fiction published in the United States during the two previous years. It is awarded by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, whose members determine the nominations, Gibsons only Nebula Award was for Neuromancer in 1985, though he has received seven other nominations. The John W. Campbell Memorial Award for Best Science Fiction Novel is awarded by a jury to a novel published during the previous year. Gibson has been nominated twice for the award, but has not won, the Philip K. Dick Award is awarded annually by a jury of writers and academics to the best original science fiction paperback published in the United States. Neuromancer won the award in 1984, and Gibson sat on the jury of the 1986 award, Gibsons Pattern Recognition was shortlisted for the award in 2004. The Prix Aurora Awards are granted annually by the Canadian SF and Fantasy Association for the best Canadian science fiction, Gibson won the best Long-form English work award twice, and received four other nominations. The British Science Fiction Association annually presents four awards, traditionally on the basis of a vote of its members, Gibson has been nominated for an award on six occasions, but has not won. The Ditmar Award is granted by the members of the annual Australian National Science Fiction Convention to recognize achievement in Australian science fiction, fantasy and horror, Gibson has been nominated for two awards, winning for Neuromancer in 1985. The Seiun Award is awarded for the best science fiction published in Japan during the preceding year, Gibson won once, for Neuromancer in 1987, and received a second nomination for All Tomorrows Parties in 2001. Conferred by vote at the annual Italcon, the Italia Awards have been granted since 1972, Gibsons Virtual Light was nominated in the inaugural International novel category in 1995, finishing second. The Southeastern SF Awards recognizing achievements in fantasy, horror and science fiction by authors connected to the Southeastern United States, were granted from 2002 to 2006 by a vote of members. Gibson, a native of South Carolina who grew up in Virginia, was recognized in 2004, the Locus Awards are presented to winners of Locus magazines annual readers poll. For each category of award, readers submit five nominations in order of preference, as such, the number of nominated works per category varies from year to year. Though none of Gibsons works have claimed first position, they have polled twenty-four times, the annual Interzone Poll is conducted by readers of the British science fiction magazine Interzone

14.
The Guardian
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The Guardian is a British daily newspaper, known from 1821 until 1959 as the Manchester Guardian. Along with its sister papers The Observer and The Guardian Weekly, The Guardian is part of the Guardian Media Group, the Scott Trust became a limited company in 2008, with a constitution to maintain the same protections for The Guardian. Profits are reinvested in journalism rather than to the benefit of an owner or shareholders, the Guardian is edited by Katharine Viner, who succeeded Alan Rusbridger in 2015. In 2016, The Guardians print edition had a daily circulation of roughly 162,000 copies in the country, behind The Daily Telegraph. The newspaper has an online UK edition as well as two international websites, Guardian Australia and Guardian US, the newspapers online edition was the fifth most widely read in the world in October 2014, with over 42.6 million readers. Its combined print and online editions reach nearly 9 million British readers, notable scoops include the 2011 News International phone hacking scandal, in particular the hacking of murdered English teenager Milly Dowlers phone. The investigation led to the closure of the UKs biggest selling Sunday newspaper, and one of the highest circulation newspapers in the world, in 2016, it led the investigation into the Panama Papers, exposing the then British Prime Minister David Camerons links to offshore bank accounts. The Guardian has been named Newspaper of the Year four times at the annual British Press Awards, the paper is still occasionally referred to by its nickname of The Grauniad, given originally for the purported frequency of its typographical errors. The Manchester Guardian was founded in Manchester in 1821 by cotton merchant John Edward Taylor with backing from the Little Circle and they launched their paper after the police closure of the more radical Manchester Observer, a paper that had championed the cause of the Peterloo Massacre protesters. They do not toil, neither do they spin, but they better than those that do. When the government closed down the Manchester Observer, the champions had the upper hand. The influential journalist Jeremiah Garnett joined Taylor during the establishment of the paper, the prospectus announcing the new publication proclaimed that it would zealously enforce the principles of civil and religious Liberty. Warmly advocate the cause of Reform, endeavour to assist in the diffusion of just principles of Political Economy and. Support, without reference to the party from which they emanate, in 1825 the paper merged with the British Volunteer and was known as The Manchester Guardian and British Volunteer until 1828. The working-class Manchester and Salford Advertiser called the Manchester Guardian the foul prostitute, the Manchester Guardian was generally hostile to labours claims. The Manchester Guardian dismissed strikes as the work of outside agitators –, if an accommodation can be effected, the occupation of the agents of the Union is gone. CP Scott made the newspaper nationally recognised and he was editor for 57 years from 1872, and became its owner when he bought the paper from the estate of Taylors son in 1907. Under Scott, the moderate editorial line became more radical, supporting William Gladstone when the Liberals split in 1886

15.
List of works by William Gibson
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The works of William Gibson encompass literature, journalism, acting, recitation, and performance art. Gibsons early short fiction is recognized as cyberpunks finest work, effectively renovating the science fiction genre which had been considered widely insignificant. He wrote the critically acclaimed artists book Agrippa in 1992 before co-authoring The Difference Engine and he then spent an unfruitful period as a Hollywood screenwriter, with few of his projects seeing the light of day and those that did being critically unsuccessful. Although he had largely abandoned short fiction by the mid-1990s, Gibson returned to writing novels, completing his second trilogy, the Bridge trilogy at the close of the millennium. After writing two episodes of the television series The X-Files around this time, Gibson was featured as the subject of a film, No Maps for These Territories. His third trilogy of novels, Pattern Recognition, Spook Country, hippy Hat Brain Parasite in Shiner, Lewis, Modern Stories No. The Nazi Lawn Dwarf Murders Doing Television in Dorsey, Candas Jane, darwin in The Face, March 1990, and Spin, April 1990, 21–23. Cyber-Claus in The Washington Post Book World, 1991-12-01, where the Holograms Go in Trilling, Roger. Thirteen Views of a Cardboard City in Garnett, David, clarkston, White Wolf Pub. pp. 338–349. Dougal Discarnate in Gartner, Zsuzsi, ed. Darwins Bastards, the Net Is a Waste of Time. and Thats Exactly Whats Right About It, The New York Times Magazine 1996-07-14,31. Virtual Lit, A Discussion Biblion, The Bulletin of The New York Public Library, Fall 1996, ISSN 1064-301X OCLC26244071 Jack Womak and the Horned Heart of Neuropa Science Fiction Eye, Fall 1997. ISSN 1071-3018 OCLC22440318 Dead Man Sings Forbes ASAP,30 November 1998 supp, ISSN 1078-9901 OCLC173437996 William Gibsons fiction of cyber-eternity may become a reality. HQ issue 63,122, March 1,1999, Modern boys and mobile girls, The Observer, April 1,2001. Metrophagy Whole Earth Catalog, Summer 2001 and my Own Private Tokyo, Wired,9.09 Blasted Dreams in Mr. Buks Window, National Post, 2001-09-20 Shiny Balls Of Mud, Tate Magazine, issue 1, September/October 2002. Googles Earth, The New York Times, August 31,2010,25 Years of Digital Vandalism, The New York Times, January 27,2011. William Gibson, The Art of Fiction No,211, The Paris Review, June 1,2011. Life in the Meta City, Scientific American, August 19,2011, William Gibson on The Stars My Destination, Library of America, February 23,2012. 1977, in Punk, An Aesthetic by Johan Kugelberg, reproduced in The Huffington Post and we Cant Know What the Future Will Bring, The Wall Street Journal, October 25,2012

16.
Bridge trilogy
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The Bridge trilogy is a series of novels by William Gibson, his second after the successful Sprawl trilogy. The trilogy comprises the novels Virtual Light, Idoru, and All Tomorrows Parties, a short story, Skinners Room, was originally composed for Visionary San Francisco, a 1990 museum exhibition exploring the future of San Francisco. The first book of the Bridge trilogy is set in an imaginary 2006, the trilogy derives its name from the San Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge, which was abandoned in an earthquake and has become a massive shantytown and a site of improvised shelter. The bridge becomes a location in Virtual Light and All Tomorrows Parties. Characters in each novel interact in a construct of Kowloon Walled City. The walled city shares a number of features with the bridge itself, including an emphasis on self-governance, the novels of the Bridge trilogy loosely share a common cast of characters. Former police officer Berry Rydell and bicycle courier Chevette Washington occupy central roles in the first, researcher Colin Laney, who has a mysterious ability to identify patterns in vast tracts of information, appears in Idoru and All Tomorrows Parties. Other recurring characters include Rei Toei, an AI pop star, and Shinya Yamazaki, the Bridge trilogy incorporates elements of William Gibsons recurring exploration of the intersection of technology, traumatic change, and cyborg self-perceptions. The original San Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge exists within the old system of steel-based construction techniques. After the traumatic shock of the earthquake, which both the literal bridge and the technological system of which it is a part, a new technological system emerges. Two representative examples of the new technology are the tunnel that replaces the bridge. The concept of the nodal point permeates the Bridge trilogy, Virtual Light, the first novel in the series, was nominated for both the Hugo and Locus Awards in 1994

17.
Virtual Light
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Virtual Light is the first book in William Gibsons Bridge trilogy. Virtual Light is a novel set in a postmodern, dystopian. The term Virtual Light was coined by scientist Stephen Beck to describe a form of instrumentation that produces optical sensations directly in the eye without the use of photons, the novel was a finalist nominee for a Hugo Award, and shortlisted for the Locus Award in 1994. Chevette, on a whim, steals a pair of dark-rimmed glasses from a man at a party because she is offended by his demeanor, soon after, she realizes that the glasses have unlikely importance, as security company henchmen begin tracking and following her. Among the pursuers are Svobodov and Orlovsky, two Russian immigrants who reside in San Francisco and are employed as cops, as well as Loveless, when Rydell is given the mission, he is not informed of the significance of the glasses and the information they contain. Eventually, the plot climaxes when Rydell, Loveless, Warbaby, Orlovsky, the cops want the glasses, as does Rydell. Realizing the inherent danger of the situation, Rydell is forced to decide whom to side with and he decides to fight off Orlovsky and Svobodov and shirk his agreement with Warbaby. A subplot also focuses on a relationship between Chevette and Rydell, which is initially restricted because of the nature of their circumstances. Another subplot focuses on a Japanese sociologist named Shinya Yamazaki, who is studying the bridge dwellers. The subplot largely focuses on his interactions with Skinner, an old man who lives in a shack high atop one of the support pylons. Others pursue livelihood in innocuous yet unregulated commerce such as by running antique shops and barbershops, a major theme of Virtual Light is class conflict, Warbaby and the elite are placed against Rydell and Chevette. The elite see themselves as superior, and view the underclass as amoral, ruthless. Another important element, which is common to cyberpunk, is the idea of the power structure withholding information from the general population. The information, in case, are the plans to rebuild an entire city completely, regardless of what its inhabitants think. Chevette Washington, a messenger with a rough past and uncertain future. At one point she was imprisoned, but escaped and was able to find a job as a courier. Berry Rydell, a security officer who has drifted from one job to another ever since his killing of a suspect. Lucius Warbaby, a bounty hunter hired to retrieve the stolen glasses by the corporation that made them and he in turn hires Rydell to assist him in finding the person who stole them

18.
Idoru
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Idoru is the second book in William Gibsons Bridge trilogy. Idoru is a novel set in a postmodern, dystopian. The main character, Colin Laney, has a talent for identifying nodal points, analogous to Gibsons own, there are bits of the literal future right here, right now, if you know how to look for them. Although I can’t tell you how, it’s a non-rational process, Blackwell believes that someone is manipulating Rez, and wants Laney to find out who. Simultaneously, the Seattle chapter of the Lo/Rez fan club is discussing exactly the same topic of the marriage of human. Fourteen-year-old Chia Pet McKenzie is chosen by the group to go to Tokyo, on the flight she meets a woman named Maryalice, who dupes her into unwittingly carrying a contraband item through customs in Tokyo. In the course of this job he feels responsible for the death of an innocent party. His talent had allowed him a foreshadowing of a probable suicide, however, Laneys conscience snapped and he attempted at the last moment to stop the suicide, but instead became mired in a scandal. Yet another organization claiming to be a media watchdog steps in and this goes awry and Laney is left high and dry and alone. Chia, after being brought to the run by Maryalice’s boyfriend Eddie, is helped to escape by one of the club’s employees who perceives that she is in danger. She takes with her the contraband which was slipped into her luggage, when she meets with the local Tokyo chapter of the Lo/Rez fan club she is disappointed by their seeming indifference to the impending “wedding” and they inform her this is merely an unfounded rumor. Disbelieving, Chia decides to investigate on her own and seeks the help of her host Mitsuko’s brother Masahiko, Masahiko is informed by other denizens of Walled City that he is being watched, both on the net and physically at his home. Chia admits to Masahiko that she has something in her luggage. The contraband turns out to be a highly illegal nanotech assembler, a used for high-speed material fabrication. Chia and Masahiko go to a hotel to try to hide from the searchers. It is here that all the parties converge, when Chia and Masahiko link into the net, the Idoru manifests herself in Chias Venice simulation after she realizes that Chia is playing a part in her evolution. Maryalice finds the hotel through their record, letting herself into their room. Lamenting her recent breakup with Eddie over the smuggling operation

19.
All Tomorrow's Parties (novel)
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All Tomorrows Parties is the third and final novel in William Gibsons Bridge trilogy. Like its predecessors, All Tomorrows Parties is a fiction novel set in a postmodern, dystopian. The novel borrows its title from a song by Velvet Underground and it is written in the third person and deals with Gibsonian themes of emergent technology. The novel was published by Viking Press on October 7,1999. The book has three separate but overlapping stories, with the appearance of shared characters. The San Francisco/Oakland Bay Bridge, the setting of the trilogy, functions as a shared location of their convergence. The first story features former rent-a-cop Berry Rydell, the protagonist of Virtual Light, as a child, Laney was the subject of pharmaceutical trials which damaged his nervous system. This makes him ideal for the role of netrunner or data analyst, a side effect of 5-SB, the drug administered to Laney, causes the user to become attached to strong personalities. As a result, Laney has become obsessed with media baron Cody Harwood of Harwood/Levine and he spends his life surfing the net from his enclave in the subway, searching for traces of Harwood in the media. From this, Laney foresees a crucial historical shift which may precede the end of the world as we know it and he predicts that Harwood, who had also taken 5-SB before, knows this and will try to shape this historical shift to his liking. To stop Harwood, Laney hires Rydell under the guise of a courier to travel to San Francisco where he believes the next nodal point will congeal, the second story concerns ex-bicycle messenger Chevette Washington, also from Virtual Light, who is on the run from her ex-boyfriend. She escapes to her home, San Franciscos bridge community, to find refuge. She is accompanied by Tessa, an Australian media sciences student who visits the bridge to film a documentary on interstitial communities, the third story follows a mysterious, left-handed mercenary named Konrad. Although Konrad is employed by Harwood, he appears to be directed by his own motives, in particular, Konrad aligns his movements with the Tao, the spontaneous, universal energy path of Taoist philosophy. Colin Laney – Data analyst with an ability to sense nodal points, Chevette Washington – an ex-bike messenger who lived on the Bridge for several years and is on the run from an abusive boyfriend. Berry Rydell – A rent-a-cop and former lover of Chevette who is working as a security guard at a convenience store Lucky Dragon in Los Angeles, shinya Yamazaki – Self-described student of existential sociology. The Suit – an impoverished ex-salaryman who lives in the Tokyo subway, Konrad – Taoist assassin hired by Harwood. Tessa – Chevettes media student roommate, who drives Chevette to the Bridge in her van in order to make a documentary on its inhabitants, boomzilla – A street impresario with designs on Tessas balloon camera

20.
Pattern Recognition (novel)
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Pattern Recognition is a novel by science fiction writer William Gibson published in 2003. Set in August and September 2002, the story follows Cayce Pollard, the novels central theme involves the examination of the human desire to detect patterns or meaning and the risks of finding patterns in meaningless data. Other themes include methods of interpretation of history, cultural familiarity with brand names, the September 11,2001 attacks are used as a motif representing the transition to the new century. Critics identify influences in Pattern Recognition from Thomas Pynchons postmodern detective story The Crying of Lot 49, Pattern Recognition is Gibsons eighth novel and his first one to be set in the contemporary world. Like his previous work, it has classified as a science fiction and postmodern novel. Critics approved of the writing but found the plot unoriginal and some of the language distracting, before writing Pattern Recognition, the author, William Gibson, published seven novels and numerous short stories beginning in 1977. His previous novel, All Tomorrows Parties, was published in October 1999 as the conclusion of the Bridge trilogy, Pattern Recognition was written between 2001 and 2002 while Gibson was living in Vancouver, British Columbia and released in February 2003. Gibson traveled to Tokyo in 2001 to prepare for this new novel, which place in London, Moscow. He did not travel to London or Moscow but used interviews with friends, in September 2001 Gibson had written about 100 pages but was struggling to finish. He stopped writing after watching the September 11,2001 attacks on television and realized had become a story that took place in a time track. He considered abandoning the novel but a few weeks later re-wrote portions to use the attacks as a factor for the distress the main character feels. In a 2003 interview he said, There I was, in the winter of 2001, in the original post-9/11 draft, London felt more like London is feeling right now. Cayce keeps seeing trucks full of soldiers, but I took that out, because as it got closer to the time, it wasnt actually happening. Advertising consultant Cayce Pollard, who reacts to logos and advertising as if to an allergen and she is working on a contract with the marketing firm Blue Ant to judge the effectiveness of a proposed corporate logo for a shoe company. During the presentation, graphic designer Dorotea Benedetti becomes hostile towards Cayce as she rejects the first proposal, Cayce had been following the film clips and participating in an online discussion forum theorizing on the clips meaning, setting, and other aspects. Wary of corrupting the artistic process and mystery of the clips, and right now there are three people in Chat, but theres no way of knowing exactly who until you are in there, and the chat room she finds not so comforting. Its strange even with friends, like sitting in a pitch-dark cellar conversing with people at a distance of fifteen feet. A friend from the group, who uses the handle Parkaboy

21.
Spook Country
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Spook Country is a 2007 novel by speculative fiction author William Gibson. Themes explored include the ubiquity of locative technology, the eversion of cyberspace, Spook Country quickly reached mainstream North American bestseller lists and was nominated for British Science Fiction Association and Locus Awards. The first strand of the novel follows Hollis Henry, a member of the early 1990s cult band The Curfew. She is hired by advertising mogul Hubertus Bigend to write a story for his nascent magazine Node about the use of technology in the art world. Helped by curator Odile Richard she investigates Los Angeles artist Alberto Corrales, Corrales leads her to Bobby Chombo, an expert in geospatial technologies who handles Corrales technical requirements. Chombos background is troubleshooting navigation systems for the United States military and he is reclusive and paranoid, refusing to sleep in the same GPS grid square on consecutive nights, and only consents to talk to Hollis due to his admiration for The Curfew. Tito is adept in a form of systema that encompasses tradecraft, a variant of free running, and it is alluded that the old man may have connections to American intelligence circles and Tito hopes he can explain the mysterious death of his father. When the old man calls in a favour, his family dispatches Tito on a new assignment. Tracking Titos family is a man known as Brown, a brusque, of neoconservative orientation, Brown appears to have a background in law enforcement, but little training in tradecraft. Milgrim is addicted to anti-anxiety drugs, and is docile and compliant by Brown. Brown believes that Tito and the old man are in possession of information that would, if revealed, in his attempts to capture them and their data, however, Brown is instead fed disinformation through the old mans intricate schemes. The three strands of the novel converge on a container of unspecified cargo that is being transported via a circuitous route to an unknown destination. In Vancouver, the old team, with Hollis in tow, irradiate the shipping container. The writing process for Spook Country began for Gibson with a desire to write a novel, the impetus for the story grew out of the authors visual impressions of Lower Manhattan in winter, from which the character of Tito emerged. Little of the material in his original pitch of the novel survived in the final draft, the original proposal focused on Warchalker, an obscure Iraqi warblog which chronicles the story of a disappeared consignment of millions of Iraqi reconstruction money. The readers of the blog included a female networks theorist interested in technology. The plot would have followed those readers attempt to track a shipping container through Warchalker on behalf of an unnamed villain, the characters from the proposal did appear in the final version, albeit in much-altered form. As Gibson developed the plot, it became apparent that Node, the shadowy magazine startup, was way Bigendian, and thus Spook Country came to inhabit the same fictional universe as its predecessor

22.
Zero History
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Zero History is a novel by William Gibson published in 2010. It concludes the trilogy begun by Pattern Recognition and continued by Spook Country. Hollis Henry and Milgrim find themselves in London working for Hubertus Bigend, one of Bigends current interests is fashion, particularly the intersection between streetwear, workwear and military clothing. Milgrim is sent to South Carolina to take photographs of a pair of Army BDUs where he gains the notice of an agent named Winnie Tung Whittaker employed by DCIS. Winnie photographs Milgrim and intimidates him into working as an informant, Bigend asks Henry and Milgrim to investigate a secret brand, named Gabriel Hounds after the English legend. At the same time, he becomes aware that a coup is being plotted within his company, revenge against Milgrim then becomes the top priority of the mercs. A parallel subplot follows Hollis as she tracks down the Gabriel Hounds designer, who although not expressly stated to be is Cayce Pollard, bobby Chombo is critical to Bigends plan to gain the ability to foresee stock market prices by a number of minutes. Events reach a climax at night in a space in London named Wormwood Scrubs where the mercs demand the prisoner exchange to take place. Gibson acknowledges the help of other authors, Cory Doctorow provided the description of a smartphone, bruce Sterling provided the concept of a T-shirt that is not recorded by CCTV

23.
The Difference Engine
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The Difference Engine is an alternative history novel by William Gibson and Bruce Sterling. It is widely regarded as a book that helped establish the conventions of steampunk. It posits a Victorian Britain in which technological and social change has occurred after entrepreneurial inventor Charles Babbage succeeded in his ambition to build a mechanical computer. The novel was nominated for the British Science Fiction Award in 1990, the Nebula Award for Best Novel in 1991, the novel is chiefly set in 1855. The historical background diverges from our timeline around 1824, when Charles Babbage succeeded in creating his Difference Engine and he became politically powerful and at the 1830 general election opposed the Tory Government of the Duke of Wellington. Wellington staged a coup détat in 1830 in an attempt to overturn his defeat and prevent the acceleration of change and social upheaval. So the Industrial Radical Party, led by a Lord Byron who had not died in the Greek War of Independence, the Tory Party and hereditary peerage were eclipsed. British trade unions assisted the ascendancy of the Industrial Radical Party, as a result, Luddite anti-technological working class revolutionaries were ruthlessly suppressed. By 1855, the Babbage computers have become mass-produced and ubiquitous, other steam-powered technologies have also developed, so, for example, Gurney steam carriages are an increasingly common sight. In the novel, the British Empire is more powerful than in our reality, thanks to the development, in addition, similar military technology has enhanced the capabilities of the armed forces, and the Babbage computers themselves. Under the Industrial Radical Party, Britain shows the utmost respect for leading scientific and industrial figures such as Isambard Kingdom Brunel and Charles Darwin. Indeed, they are collectively called savants and often raised to the peerage on their merits, causing a break with the past as regards social prestige and class distinction. These new patterns are also reflected in the sphere, classical studies have lost importance compared to more practical concerns such as engineering. Napoleon IIIs French Empire holds an entente with the British and Napoleon is even married to a British woman, in the world of The Difference Engine, it occupies Mexico, as it did briefly in reality during the American Civil War. Like Great Britain, it has its own engines, especially used in the context of domestic surveillance within its police force and intelligence agencies. Japan is awakening after the British ended its isolation, and looks, as in our world, is set to one of this worlds leading industrial. Linking all their stories is the trail of a set of reportedly very powerful computer punch cards. Many characters come to believe that the cards are a gambling modus

24.
Bruce Sterling
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Michael Bruce Sterling is an American science fiction author known for his novels and work on the Mirrorshades anthology. This work helped to define the cyberpunk genre, Sterling, along with William Gibson, Rudy Rucker, John Shirley, Lewis Shiner, and Pat Cadigan, is one of the founders of the cyberpunk movement in science fiction. In addition, he is one of the chief ideological promulgators. This has earned him the nickname Chairman Bruce and he was also one of the first organizers of the Turkey City Writers Workshop, and is a frequent attendee at the Sycamore Hill Writers Workshop. He won Hugo Awards for his novelettes Bicycle Repairman and Taklamakan and his first novel, Involution Ocean, published in 1977, features the world Nullaqua where all the atmosphere is contained in a single, miles-deep crater. The story concerns a ship sailing on the ocean of dust at the bottom and it is partially a science-fictional pastiche of Moby-Dick by Herman Melville. From the late 1970s onwards, Sterling wrote a series of set in the Shaper/Mechanist universe. The Mechanists use a great deal of computer-based mechanical technologies, the Shapers do genetic engineering on a massive scale, alastair Reynolds identified Schismatrix and the other Shaper/Mechanist stories as one of the greatest influences on his own work. In the 1980s, Sterling edited the science fiction critical fanzine Cheap Truth under the alias of Vincent Omniaveritas and he wrote a column called Catscan for the now-defunct science fiction critical magazine SF Eye. He contributed a chapter to Sound Unbound, Sampling Digital Music and he also contributed, along with Lewis Shiner, to the short story Mozart in Mirrorshades. From April 2009 through May 2009, he was an editor at Cool Tools, since October 2003 Sterling has blogged at Beyond the Beyond, which is hosted by Wired. His most recent novel is Love Is Strange, a Paranormal Romance, the Viridian Design home page, including Sterlings Viridian Manifesto and all of his Viridian Notes, is managed by Jon Lebkowsky at http, //www. viridiandesign. org. The Viridian Movement helped to spawn the popular bright green environmental weblog Worldchanging, worldChanging contributors include many of the original members of the Viridian curia. Sterling has a habit of coining neologisms to describe things that he believes will be common in the future, in the December 2005 issue of Wired magazine, Sterling coined the term buckyjunk. Buckyjunk refers to future, difficult-to-recycle consumer waste made of carbon nanotubes, in his 2005 book Shaping Things he coined the term design fiction which refers to a type of speculative design which focuses on world building. In July 1989, in SF Eye #5, he was the first to use the slipstream to refer to a type of speculative fiction between traditional science fiction and fantasy and mainstream literature. In December 1999 he coined the term Wexelblat disaster, for a disaster caused when a natural disaster triggers a secondary, in his book Zeitgeist, he introduced the term Major consensus narrative as an explanatory synonym for truth. In August 2004 he suggested a type of device that, through pervasive RFID and GPS tracking, can track its history of use

25.
The Winter Market
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The Winter Market is a science fiction short story written by William Gibson and published as part of his Burning Chrome short story collection. The market of the title was modelled on that of Granville Island, when the story was written, the retrofit was recent, and I dirtied it up for requisite punky near-future effect. In this particular tale, Lises original body is defective and failing, partially due to a congenital disease, hence, the act of leaving behind the original physical form is potentially one of escape into an untainted existence. However, the story undercuts this simplistic reading by convincingly evoking Lises humanity, characteristic of Gibsons early writing, the story conveys an individuals story mediated through the voice of another character. It also examines what constitutes waste within a consumer culture, according to the analysis of critic Pramod Nayar, the story depicts the body as a vehicle for experiencing dreams edited into Hollywood thrillers. Critic David Seed saw the character of Rubin as a thinly disguised incarnation of performance artist Mark Pauline of Survival Research Laboratories, the Winter Market at SFTropes The Winter Market at the William Gibson Aleph

26.
Skinner's Room
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Skinners Room is a short story by William Gibson originally composed for Visionary San Francisco, a 1990 museum exhibition exploring the future of San Francisco. It features the first appearance in Gibsons fiction of the Bridge, in the story, the Bridge is overrun by squatters, among them Skinner, who occupies a shack atop a bridgetower. An altered version of the story was published in Omni magazine, Skinners Room was nominated for the 1992 Locus Award for Best Short Story. The story takes place in a near-future where the United States is in decline and it is set in a decaying San Francisco in which the San Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge is closed and taken over by the homeless. The wealthy denizens of the city have retreated to gated-access enclaves, the room mentioned in the title is a shack built on top one of the bridges towers. Skinner has lived on the bridge, and in his room, for a time, and is accompanied by a girl with an interest in the history of the bridge town. The community that arose was vibrant and was watched by the worlds media, the town grew in a piecemeal fashion, built from salvaged parts as well as from material apparently donated by more wealthy nations. At the end of the story Skinner has a dream in which he remembers being at the front of the crowd who seized the bridge and scaled the towers. Skinners Room was commissioned by the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art for its exhibition Visionary San Francisco, Gibsons story inspired a contribution to the exhibition by architects Ming Fung and Craig Hodgetts. Ming and Hodgetts designed the environment which would have catalysed the transformation of the Bridge. They envisioned a San Francisco in which the live in high-tech, self-sufficient, self-contained towers, above the decrepit city and its crumbling bridge. A slightly different version of the story was featured in the November 1991 issue of Omni. The OMNI version concerns a girl and an old man named Skinner who live in the one-room shack built on top of the first cable tower of the Bridge. This version was collected in Gardner Dozois 1992 anthology The Years Best Science Fiction, Ninth Annual Collection, Skinners Room is the first appearance of the Bridge in Gibsons fiction. After its 1991 republication in OMNI, Skinners Room was nominated for the Locus Award for Best Short Story in 1992, kowloon Walled City, a former squatters town in Hong Kong and subject of Gibsons fascination Skinners Room title listing at the Internet Speculative Fiction Database

27.
Agrippa (a book of the dead)
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Agrippa is a work of art created by science fiction novelist William Gibson, artist Dennis Ashbaugh and publisher Kevin Begos Jr. in 1992. The work consists of a 300-line semi-autobiographical electronic poem by Gibson, Gibsons text focused on the ethereal nature of memories. Its principal notoriety arose from the fact that the poem, stored on a 3, a few years beforehand, Ashbaugh had written a fan letter to cyberpunk novelist William Gibson, whose oeuvre he had admired, and the pair had struck up a telephone friendship. Shortly after the project had germinated in the minds of Begos and Ashbaugh, the project manifested as a poem written by Gibson incorporated into an artists book created by Ashbaugh, as such it was as much a work of collaborative conceptual art as poetry. Gibson stated that Ashbaughs design eventually included a supposedly self-devouring floppy-disk intended to display the only once. The creators had initially intended to infect the disks with a computer virus, OK, sit down and pay attention. Were only going to say this once, the work was premiered on December 9,1992, at The Kitchen, an art space in Greenwich Village, New York City. The performance—known as The Transmission—consisted of the public reading of the poem by illusionist Penn Jillette, recorded. The poem was inscribed on a magnetic disk which had been vacuum-sealed until the events commencement. Contrary to numerous reports, neither this disk nor the diskettes embedded in the artists book were ever actually hacked in any strict sense. Academic researcher Matthew Kirschenbaum has reported that a text of the poem was released the next day on MindVox. Kirschenbaum considers Mindvox, an interface between the web and the global Internet, to have been an ideal initial host. The text spread rapidly from that point on, first on FTP servers and anonymous mailers and later via USENET, since Gibson did not use email at the time, fans sent copies of the pirated text to his fax machine. Kirschenbaum speculates that this included the offline persona of Templar or one of his associates. According to this account, ostensibly endorsed by Templar in a post to Slashdot in February 2000, Kirschenbaum declined to elaborate on the specifics of the Kroupa conjecture, which he declared himself not at liberty to disclose. Agrippa owes its transmission and continuing availability to a network of individuals, communities, ideologies, markets, technologies. Only in the most heroic reading of the events … is Agrippa saved for posterity solely by virtue of the knight Templar, because the struggle for the text is the text. Since its debut in 1992, the mystery of Agrippa remained hidden for 20 years, although many had tried to hack the code and decrypt the program, the uncompiled source code was lost long ago

28.
Disneyland with the Death Penalty
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Disneyland with the Death Penalty is a 4, 500-word article about Singapore written by William Gibson. His first major piece of non-fiction, it was first published as the story for Wired magazines September/October 1993 issue. The article follows Gibsons observations of the architecture, phenomenology and culture of Singapore, and its title and central metaphor—Singapore as Disneyland with the death penalty—is a reference to the authoritarian artifice the author perceives the city-state to be. Singapore, Gibson details, is lacking any sense of creativity or authenticity and he finds the government to be pervasive, corporatist and technocratic, and the judicial system rigid and draconian. Singaporeans are characterized as consumerists of insipid taste, though Gibsons first major piece of non-fiction, the article had an immediate and lasting impact. The title Disneyland with the Death Penalty refers to the subject of the article, beyond the airport, he notes that the natural environment has been cultivated into all-too-perfect examples of itself, such as with the abundance of golf courses. Gibson finds it painful to try to connect with the Victorian Singapore and he gives an overview of the history of Singapore from the founding of modern Singapore by Sir Stamford Raffles in 1819 to the Japanese occupation and the establishment of the Republic in 1965. He concludes that modern Singapore, effectively a one-party state and capitalist technocracy, is a product first and foremost of the vision of three-decade Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew, Gibson deplores the absence of an authentic metropolitan feeling, something which he blames for the telling lack of creativity. Amidst the near absence of bohemianism and counterculture, Gibson finds no trace of dissidence. In the place of a sex trade, the author finds government-sanctioned health centers – in fact massage parlours –, here is remarkably little, he writes of the city-state that is not the result of deliberate and no doubt carefully deliberated social policy. He returns then to the theme of the staid insipidity of the city-state, observing the unsettling cleanliness of the physical environment and the self-policing of the populace. Perhaps, he speculates, Singapores destiny will be to become nothing more than a smug, neo-Swiss enclave of order and prosperity and he expresses reservations about the justice of capital punishment and describes the Singaporeans as the true bearers of zero tolerance. After hearing the announcement of van Dammes sentencing, Gibson decides to leave, checks out in time from the hotel. The essay ends with the declaration I loosened my tie, clearing Singapore airspace, the Singapore government responded to the publication of the article by banning Wired from the country. The phrase Disneyland with the penalty became a famous and widely referenced description for the nation. The endless malls are filled with shops selling exactly the same products and you could easily put together a smarter outfit shopping exclusively in Heathrow. Disneyland with the Death Penalty was assigned as reading on the topic of Singaporean progress for a 2008 National University of Singapore Writing & Critical Thinking course, the piece was included in a 2012 compilation of Gibsons non-fiction writing, Distrust That Particular Flavor. The article provoked a strong critical reaction, the Boston Globe characterized it as a biting piece on the technocratic state in Singapore

29.
No Maps for These Territories
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No Maps for These Territories is an independent documentary film made by Mark Neale focusing on the speculative fiction author William Gibson. It features appearances by Jack Womack, Bruce Sterling, Bono, the film had its world premiere at the Vancouver International Film Festival in October 2000. The documentary was intended to assuage the dearth of knowledge of Gibsons perspectives on self, career and culture, the film was shot on location in the United States, Canada, Ireland, and the United Kingdom. He is occasionally prompted by an unseen figure, female in voice. In the film, while recounting his childhood near Conway, South Carolina, Gibson reflects on his works, saying, Im not a didactic writer. Theres nothing I want less to be than someone couching a conscious message in prose fiction. But, I think one of the things that I see when I look back at my work is a struggle to recognize and accept that the heart is the master. And that that is always the case, except when it isnt the case were in deep, deep trouble. And were often in deep, deep trouble, in The End of Celluloid, historian of digital art Matt Hanson argues that No Maps was a film that could not have been made before the advent of digital technology. Archived from the original on June 5,2008

30.
Distrust That Particular Flavor
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Distrust That Particular Flavor is a collection of non-fiction writing by the speculative fiction author William Gibson. It consists of pieces written over a period of more than twenty years. The anthology includes a range of formats, including essays, magazine pieces, album reviews, since making a name for himself as a leading figure in the cyberpunk genre with his Sprawl trilogy of novels, Gibson has been primarily known as a writer of science or speculative fiction. However, beginning in the eighties, he has regularly penned non-fiction pieces for various publications. Gibson credits his agent for the idea of a collection, according to the writer, the pieces in Distrust That Particular Flavor were written between the late 1980s and 2010. Some were originally published as articles in Time, Rolling Stone. Some appeared as forewords to books by other authors, several speeches appear in written form for the first time. In Disneyland with the Death Penalty, which appeared in a 1993 issue of Wired. Criticisms in the article resulted in the Singapore government banning Wired from the country, the essay Rocket Radio, which appeared in Rolling Stone, covers the evolution of communications from the crystal radio to the Internet. Written in the late 1980s, it features Gibson theorizing on the future of the then-nascent Net, dead Man Sings takes a more autobiographical note, memories of his childhood are interspersed with an exploration of visual and audio media, and their effect on time. The writer delves into psychogeography in his review of Peter Ackroyds London, The Biography, entitled Metrophagy, several pieces cover music and fine arts. Any Mount of the World is a review of a Steely Dan live album, Gibson is a fan of the group. Introduction, The Body looks at the Australian-Cypriot performance artist Stelarc, the collection features Gibsons writings on three of his favourite authors, Jorge Luis Borges, George Orwell and H. G. Wells. The writers various obsessions feature in other pieces, such as vintage watches, introduction, African Thumb Piano – not previously published Rocket Radio – first published in Rolling Stone, June 15,1989 Since 1948 – WilliamGibsonBooks. 177 Up the Line – not previously published Disneyland with the Death Penalty – Wired, issue 1.04,1993 Mr. Modern Boys and Mobile Girls – The Observer and my Obsession – Wired, issue 7.01. 1999 My Own Private Tokyo – Wired, issue 9

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Kill Switch (The X-Files)
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Kill Switch is the eleventh episode of the fifth season of the science fiction television series The X-Files. It premiered in the United States on the Fox network on February 15,1998 and it was written by William Gibson and Tom Maddox and directed by Rob Bowman. The episode is a Monster-of-the-Week story, unconnected to the wider mythology. Kill Switch earned a Nielsen household rating of 11.1, the episode received mostly positive reviews from television critics, with several complimenting Fox Mulders virtual experience. The show centers on FBI special agents Fox Mulder and Dana Scully who work on cases linked to the paranormal, Mulder is a believer in the paranormal, while the skeptical Scully has been assigned to debunk his work. Kill Switch was co-written by cyberpunk pioneers William Gibson and Tom Maddox, the two eventually wrote another episode for the show, season sevens First Person Shooter. Kill Switch was written after Gibson and Maddox approached the series, reminiscent of the dark visions of filmmaker David Cronenberg, the episode contained many obvious pokes and prods at high-end academic cyberculture. In addition, Kill Switch contained several scenes featuring elaborate explosives and digital effects, Kill Switch deals with various Gibsonian themes, including, alienation, paranoia, artificial intelligence, and transferring ones consciousness into cyberspace, among others. At a diner in Washington, D. C. a man tries to access files on a laptop computer, meanwhile, several drug dealers receive anonymous phone calls about the whereabouts of their competitors, they are told that they are at the same diner. Two U. S. Marshals receive a phone call about an escaped prisoner. The drug dealers arrive in pairs as the man attempts to access to the files. Just as he does, the two Marshals appear and order everyone onto the floor, causing a shootout, Fox Mulder and Dana Scully arrive and identify the bodies of the drug dealers. Mulder also identifies the man with the laptop as Donald Gelman, Mulder takes Gelmans laptop and finds a CD inside. When he puts it into the car stereo, it plays Twilight Time by The Platters, however, the agents take it to the Lone Gunmen, who discover that the disc contains a large quantity of encrypted data. The trio, however, are unable to decipher it, upon Scullys suggestion, they access Gelmans e-mail account and find a message sent by someone named Invisigoth, saying that someone named David is missing. The message contains a BIC code for a shipping container. When they approach it, a woman attempts to flee but is captured by Scully, the container turns out to be full of state-of-the-art computer equipment. The woman, the Invisigoth theyve been looking for, warns the agents that a laser-armed Defense Department satellite has pinpointed their location and they quickly leave the area as the container is destroyed

32.
First Person Shooter (The X-Files)
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First Person Shooter is the thirteenth episode of the seventh season of the science fiction television series The X-Files. It premiered on the Fox network in the United States on February 27,2000, the episode is a Monster-of-the-Week story, unconnected to the series wider mythology. First Person Shooter earned a Nielsen household rating of 9.3, the episode received mostly negative reviews from critics. The show centers on FBI special agents Fox Mulder and Dana Scully who work on cases linked to the paranormal, Mulder is a believer in the paranormal, while the skeptical Scully has been assigned to debunk his work. First Person Shooter was written by noted authors William Gibson and Tom Maddox, in addition, the episode serves as the spiritual successor to Gibson and Maddoxs earlier episode Kill Switch. Gibson was motivated to write the episode after the success of Kill Switch, the episode featured several elaborate special effects sequences that nearly put the episode over budget. The episode opens with three men, fitted with futuristic combat gear and automatic weapons, entering the reality game First Person Shooter. In a control room, Ivan and Phoebe, the programmers, are monitoring the players vital signs. Only one of the players makes it to the level of the violent game. She introduces herself as Maitreya, stating, This is my game and she then kills the player with a flintlock pistol. Fox Mulder and Dana Scully visit the headquarters of First Person Shooterss developers in Inland Empire, California, where they meet the Lone Gunmen and they look at the body of the player, which clearly displays a gunshot wound. Ivan claims there is no way a real gun could have brought into the highly-secured building. The agents are shown a video from the game, featuring the character who killed the player. Mulder takes the printout of the character and shows it to a detective, daryl Musashi, a famous computer hacker, arrives at the building and enters the game to kill Maitreya. However, the character cuts off Musashis head and hands with a medieval sword. Mulder receives a call from the Sheriffs Department that a similar to the one in the printout has been picked up. The woman, a stripper named Jade Blue Afterglow, tells the agents that she was paid by an imaging facility in Culver City. Mulder and Scully find out that the Lone Gunmen have become trapped inside First Person Shooter, Mulder enters the game, where he sees Maitreya and follows her

William Gibson
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William Ford Gibson is an American-Canadian speculative fiction writer and essayist widely credited with pioneering the science fiction subgenre known as cyberpunk. Gibson notably coined the term cyberspace in his short story Burning Chrome and these early works have been credited with renovating science fiction literature after it had fallen large

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Gibson on his 60th birthday in Paris during a promotional interview for the French release of Spook Country (March 17, 2008)

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William S. Burroughs at his 70th birthday party in 1984. Burroughs, more than any other beat generation writer, was an important influence on the adolescent Gibson.

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Gibson at a 2007 reading of Spook Country in Victoria, British Columbia. Since " The Winter Market " (1985), commissioned by Vancouver Magazine with the stipulation that it be set in the city, Gibson actively avoided using his adopted home as a setting until Spook Country.

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The San Francisco – Oakland Bay Bridge, a fictional squatted version of which constitutes the setting for Gibson's Bridge trilogy.

Science fiction
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Science fiction often explores the potential consequences of scientific and other innovations, and has been called a literature of ideas. Science fiction is difficult to define, as it includes a range of subgenres and themes. Author and editor Damon Knight summed up the difficulty, saying science fiction is what we point to when we say it, a defini

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A futuristic setting is a common but not a necessary hallmark of science fiction. A common thread in science fiction is exploring the potential consequences of scientific and other innovations on people's lives.

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H. G. Wells

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Jules Verne

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Arthur C. Clarke

Cyberpunk
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The settings are usually post-industrial dystopias but tend to feature extraordinary cultural ferment and the use of technology in ways never anticipated by its original inventors. Much of the genres atmosphere echoes film noir, and written works in the often use techniques from detective fiction. Primary exponents of the field include William Gibs

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William Gibson's Sprawl trilogy novels are famous early cyberpunk novels.

Neuromancer
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Neuromancer is a 1984 science fiction novel by American-Canadian writer William Gibson. It is one of the works in the cyberpunk genre and the first novel to win the Nebula Award, the Philip K. Dick Award. It was Gibsons debut novel and the beginning of the Sprawl trilogy, the novel tells the story of a washed-up computer hacker hired by a mysteriou

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First edition

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Cover of a Brazilian edition, depicting the character of "razorgirl" Molly Millions

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Cover art of volume one of the Tom de Haven and Jensen graphic novel adaptation, published by Epic Comics in 1989.

Count Zero
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Count Zero is a science fiction novel written by William Gibson, originally published 1986. It is the volume of the Sprawl trilogy, which begins with Neuromancer and concludes with Mona Lisa Overdrive. Count Zero was serialized by Isaac Asimovs Science Fiction Magazine in the 1986 January, February, the black and white story art was produced by J.

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Cover of first edition (hardcover)

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Cover of the April 1987 Ace paperback edition with cover art by Richard Berry.

Johnny Mnemonic
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Johnny Mnemonic is a short story by William Gibson and the inspiration behind the 1995 film of the same name. The short story first appeared in Omni magazine in May 1981, and was included in 1986s Burning Chrome. It takes place in the world of Gibsons cyberpunk novels, predating them by some years, and introduces the character Molly Millions, who p

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Standalone edition cover

Burning Chrome
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Burning Chrome is a short story, written by William Gibson and first published in Omni in July 1982. Gibson first read the story at a science fiction convention in Denver, Colorado in the autumn of 1981, to an audience of four people, among them Bruce Sterling. It was nominated for a Nebula Award in 1983 and collected with the rest of Gibsons early

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Burning Chrome Cover Art

Corporations
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A corporation is a company or group of people authorized to act as a single entity and recognized as such in law. Early incorporated entities were established by charter, most jurisdictions now allow the creation of new corporations through registration. Corporations chartered in regions where they are distinguished by whether they are allowed to b

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McDonald's Corporation is one of the most recognizable corporations in the world.

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1/8 share of the Stora Kopparberg mine, dated June 16, 1288.

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A bond issued by the Dutch East India Company, dating from 1623, for the amount of 2,400 florins

World War III
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World War III and Third World War are names given to a hypothetical third worldwide military conflict subsequent to World War I and World War II. The term has been in use since the end of World War II, during the inter-war period between the two World Wars, WW I was typically referred to simply as The Great War and was almost never referred to as t

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Map of the Metro-2 system as supposed by the United States military intelligence in 1991.

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FEMA -estimated primary counterforce targets for Soviet ICBMs. The resulting fallout is indicated, with the darkest zones considered "lethal."

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Carrier strike groups would be central players in any major Third World War, although their effectiveness against ballistic missile threats is much debated in military circles. Previous plans for WWIII such as Operation Deep Water and Operation Strikeback have given carrier groups a central role. [citation needed]

Unintended consequence
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In the social sciences, unintended consequences are outcomes that are not the ones foreseen and intended by a purposeful action. The term was popularised in the century by American sociologist Robert K. Merton. Unintended consequences can be grouped into three types, Unexpected benefit, A positive unexpected benefit, Unexpected drawback, An unexpec

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An erosion gully in Australia caused by rabbits. The release of rabbits in Australia for hunting purposes has had serious unintended ecological consequences.

Brain-computer interface
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BCIs are often directed at researching, mapping, assisting, augmenting, or repairing human cognitive or sensory-motor functions. Research on BCIs began in the 1970s at the University of California, Los Angeles under a grant from the National Science Foundation, the papers published after this research also mark the first appearance of the expressio

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Diagram of the BCI developed by Miguel Nicolelis and colleagues for use on Rhesus monkeys

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Dummy unit illustrating the design of a BrainGate interface

Artificial intelligence
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Artificial intelligence is intelligence exhibited by machines. Colloquially, the artificial intelligence is applied when a machine mimics cognitive functions that humans associate with other human minds, such as learning. As machines become increasingly capable, mental facilities once thought to require intelligence are removed from the definition,

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Kismet, a robot with rudimentary social skills

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An ontology represents knowledge as a set of concepts within a domain and the relationships between those concepts.

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Main articles

Awards and nominations of William Gibson
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William Gibson is an American-Canadian writer who has been called the noir prophet of the cyberpunk subgenre of science fiction. Since first being published in the late 1970s, Gibson has written more than twenty short stories and his early works are bleak, noir near-future stories about the relationship between humans and technology – a combination

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Portrait of Gibson in Paris on the occasion of his 60th birthday, May 17, 2008

The Guardian
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The Guardian is a British daily newspaper, known from 1821 until 1959 as the Manchester Guardian. Along with its sister papers The Observer and The Guardian Weekly, The Guardian is part of the Guardian Media Group, the Scott Trust became a limited company in 2008, with a constitution to maintain the same protections for The Guardian. Profits are re

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The Guardian' s Newsroom visitor centre and archive (No 60), with an old sign with the name The Manchester Guardian

List of works by William Gibson
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The works of William Gibson encompass literature, journalism, acting, recitation, and performance art. Gibsons early short fiction is recognized as cyberpunks finest work, effectively renovating the science fiction genre which had been considered widely insignificant. He wrote the critically acclaimed artists book Agrippa in 1992 before co-authorin

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William Gibson in 2007

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Gibson discussing Spook Country (2007) on August 8, 2007 while touring in support of the novel.

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The San Francisco – Oakland Bay Bridge, a fictional squatted version of which formed the setting for Gibson's short story " Skinner's Room " (1990). He would later revisit the setting in his Bridge trilogy of novels.

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A neck barcode tattoo, the sole element of Gibson's Alien 3 script which was included in the final cut of the film.

Bridge trilogy
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The Bridge trilogy is a series of novels by William Gibson, his second after the successful Sprawl trilogy. The trilogy comprises the novels Virtual Light, Idoru, and All Tomorrows Parties, a short story, Skinners Room, was originally composed for Visionary San Francisco, a 1990 museum exhibition exploring the future of San Francisco. The first boo

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The titular Bridge, pre-quake

Virtual Light
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Virtual Light is the first book in William Gibsons Bridge trilogy. Virtual Light is a novel set in a postmodern, dystopian. The term Virtual Light was coined by scientist Stephen Beck to describe a form of instrumentation that produces optical sensations directly in the eye without the use of photons, the novel was a finalist nominee for a Hugo Awa

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First US edition

Idoru
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Idoru is the second book in William Gibsons Bridge trilogy. Idoru is a novel set in a postmodern, dystopian. The main character, Colin Laney, has a talent for identifying nodal points, analogous to Gibsons own, there are bits of the literal future right here, right now, if you know how to look for them. Although I can’t tell you how, it’s a non-rat

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cover of the United Kingdom edition

All Tomorrow's Parties (novel)
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All Tomorrows Parties is the third and final novel in William Gibsons Bridge trilogy. Like its predecessors, All Tomorrows Parties is a fiction novel set in a postmodern, dystopian. The novel borrows its title from a song by Velvet Underground and it is written in the third person and deals with Gibsonian themes of emergent technology. The novel wa

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Cover of the British edition.

Pattern Recognition (novel)
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Pattern Recognition is a novel by science fiction writer William Gibson published in 2003. Set in August and September 2002, the story follows Cayce Pollard, the novels central theme involves the examination of the human desire to detect patterns or meaning and the risks of finding patterns in meaningless data. Other themes include methods of inter

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Original first edition cover

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Book covers for the (top left to right) North American (paperback), British (hard cover), British (paperback), Dutch, French, (bottom left to right) Spanish, Portuguese, German, Japanese, and Polish releases

Spook Country
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Spook Country is a 2007 novel by speculative fiction author William Gibson. Themes explored include the ubiquity of locative technology, the eversion of cyberspace, Spook Country quickly reached mainstream North American bestseller lists and was nominated for British Science Fiction Association and Locus Awards. The first strand of the novel follow

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A firefighter stands amidst the wreckage of the World Trade Center in New York City. Gibson saw the September 11 attacks as a nodal point in history, and their sociopolitical impact was a major theme of the novel.

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Author William Gibson, whose command of prose in the novel was the subject of critical acclaim.

Zero History
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Zero History is a novel by William Gibson published in 2010. It concludes the trilogy begun by Pattern Recognition and continued by Spook Country. Hollis Henry and Milgrim find themselves in London working for Hubertus Bigend, one of Bigends current interests is fashion, particularly the intersection between streetwear, workwear and military clothi

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Cover of the United Kingdom edition

The Difference Engine
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The Difference Engine is an alternative history novel by William Gibson and Bruce Sterling. It is widely regarded as a book that helped establish the conventions of steampunk. It posits a Victorian Britain in which technological and social change has occurred after entrepreneurial inventor Charles Babbage succeeded in his ambition to build a mechan

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Cover of first edition (hardcover)

Bruce Sterling
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Michael Bruce Sterling is an American science fiction author known for his novels and work on the Mirrorshades anthology. This work helped to define the cyberpunk genre, Sterling, along with William Gibson, Rudy Rucker, John Shirley, Lewis Shiner, and Pat Cadigan, is one of the founders of the cyberpunk movement in science fiction. In addition, he

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Cover of a French collection of Gibson's short stories, with "Fragments" as the title story

The Winter Market
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The Winter Market is a science fiction short story written by William Gibson and published as part of his Burning Chrome short story collection. The market of the title was modelled on that of Granville Island, when the story was written, the retrofit was recent, and I dirtied it up for requisite punky near-future effect. In this particular tale, L

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A 2010 photograph of the interior of the Granville Island public market, on which the market of the story's title is based

Skinner's Room
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Skinners Room is a short story by William Gibson originally composed for Visionary San Francisco, a 1990 museum exhibition exploring the future of San Francisco. It features the first appearance in Gibsons fiction of the Bridge, in the story, the Bridge is overrun by squatters, among them Skinner, who occupies a shack atop a bridgetower. An altered

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Untitled by Ming + Hodgetts, a depiction of the Bridge inspired by "Skinner's Room" and contributed to the Visionary San Francisco Exhibition. Ming + Hodgetts depiction of the Bridge inspired Gibson's Bridge trilogy.

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A cable tower of the San Francisco – Oakland Bay Bridge, is the fictional location of Skinner's room. "Skinner's Room" is the first appearance of "the Bridge" in Gibson's fiction, prior to its use as the setting of his Bridge trilogy.

Agrippa (a book of the dead)
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Agrippa is a work of art created by science fiction novelist William Gibson, artist Dennis Ashbaugh and publisher Kevin Begos Jr. in 1992. The work consists of a 300-line semi-autobiographical electronic poem by Gibson, Gibsons text focused on the ethereal nature of memories. Its principal notoriety arose from the fact that the poem, stored on a 3,

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Agrippa (A Book of the Dead)

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William Gibson, author of the Agrippa poem, pictured in Paris on his 60th birthday, May 17, 2008.

Disneyland with the Death Penalty
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Disneyland with the Death Penalty is a 4, 500-word article about Singapore written by William Gibson. His first major piece of non-fiction, it was first published as the story for Wired magazines September/October 1993 issue. The article follows Gibsons observations of the architecture, phenomenology and culture of Singapore, and its title and cent

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Nightscape of the article's subject, Singapore

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William Gibson

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Skyscrapers in Raffles Place in the Central Business District

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An aerial shot from 1989 of the squat enclave Kowloon Walled City, which Gibson contrasts favourably with Singapore

No Maps for These Territories
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No Maps for These Territories is an independent documentary film made by Mark Neale focusing on the speculative fiction author William Gibson. It features appearances by Jack Womack, Bruce Sterling, Bono, the film had its world premiere at the Vancouver International Film Festival in October 2000. The documentary was intended to assuage the dearth

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DVD cover for the documentary

Distrust That Particular Flavor
–
Distrust That Particular Flavor is a collection of non-fiction writing by the speculative fiction author William Gibson. It consists of pieces written over a period of more than twenty years. The anthology includes a range of formats, including essays, magazine pieces, album reviews, since making a name for himself as a leading figure in the cyberp

1.
U.S. first edition cover

Kill Switch (The X-Files)
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Kill Switch is the eleventh episode of the fifth season of the science fiction television series The X-Files. It premiered in the United States on the Fox network on February 15,1998 and it was written by William Gibson and Tom Maddox and directed by Rob Bowman. The episode is a Monster-of-the-Week story, unconnected to the wider mythology. Kill Sw

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A virtual Dana Scully attacks a nurse in Fox Mulder 's AI -controlled reverie. The scene was made by a freelance animator and received praise from several critics.

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The episode was co-written by noted author William Gibson.

First Person Shooter (The X-Files)
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First Person Shooter is the thirteenth episode of the seventh season of the science fiction television series The X-Files. It premiered on the Fox network in the United States on February 27,2000, the episode is a Monster-of-the-Week story, unconnected to the series wider mythology. First Person Shooter earned a Nielsen household rating of 9.3, the

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Bigend's appearance is compared by the protagonist of Gibson's Pattern Recognition to that of actor Tom Cruise "on a diet of virgins' blood and truffled chocolates". Cruise pictured here at the 2007 London Film Festival.